Lunar Wraiths (11th legion)
"The blood of my people, of your people, drenched this very soil making it most sacred. We stand as keepers of the old ways. We are the daughters of Avalon and until we draw breath nothing will defile our home" - Alesia Children of two worlds The geneseed of the Lunar Wraiths comes directly from Alesia, their primarch, and as such they share with her the similarity to the eldar race. This makes them thinner and faster than an average marine at the price of durability. While eldar would normally consider this a pathetic try to mimic their biology, the exodites which inhabited Avalon interceded for them with their kin. The reaction among the craftworld had been strongly split between two polar opposites: Those who saw potential allies in them and those who still considered them abominations. Either way the Avalonian's culture which the legion breathed since its inception was strongly influenced by the eldar's one trapping the astartes in a dilemma about their true belonging. The Varyn forest In ancient times before the first humans came to the planet this was the central hub of the Exodites' rituals and, as such, the place where their world spirit was at its strongest. In time as the exodites became fewer and fewer in numbers they retreated on the mountains and came back to the forest only for the most important rituals. When the humans who founded the first tribes tried to explore the place the eldar spirits were angered and mentally assaulted the explorators making them lose their mind as well as the way home. This earned the forest a sinister reputation and only the bravest of man dared to set foot in it to prove their worth. Only those with an exceptional willpower or those that the world spirit deemed worthy could make through it. This trial is used by the Lunar Wraiths to chose their recruit. Whoever manages to cross the forest and reach the fortress monastery in its center can ask either a token of success(those who bear such a token are held in such a high estim that rulers grant them titles and lands to have them fight for them). However, when the one who completes the trial meet the requisites to be implanted with the geneseed, she may ask to be recruited into the legion. Temple of Luna Built around the physical locus of Avalon's world spirit it houses the fortress monastery of the Lunar Wraiths. Needless to say that this choice made more than one eldar to protest but the last word must be of the Exodites which considered this the best way to protect it. Most of the needed structures of the monastery are built underground for not disfiguring the sacred place. Mobile walls are installed around the complex adn in case of attack they can quickly rise to form an impenetrable belt of steel. In the surface there is the arena where Astartes train in melee combat and other activities which don't involve shooting. The access to the underground structure is situated into a small castle which can work also as a watch tower and hosts the landing platform for flying crafts. Legion's organization the legion uses a system of ranks based on experience and merit. This rank is used to efiiciently build squadrons tailored for particular mission. Different missions are given a code based on its difficulty and skills necessary and are called "hunts". For example: a low risk mission involving a lot if intelligence work would be assigned the code: "Hare hunt" due to the difficulty been given by the animal's elusiveness. the most difficult types of missions are coded "Dragon hunt" or "Great hunt" the latter being given only to missions on which its outcome can massively influence Avalon's future. As of today this code had been used only one time when an hive fleet made route towards Avalon. For what concerns the chain of command it constantly changes to face the situation. Each single squadron's leader has decisional power over everything concerning his actual task. For the more complex campaigns a war leader is chosen and she has the power to form squadrons and assign them tasks. Geneseed Being Alesia female, her geneseed has better chance to be accepted by females, while it is possible for a male to be implanted with it the chance of success are so dim that it would be more of a death sentence. For this reason the Lunar Wraiths draw their recruits only among female individuals. The lighter frame made them more prone to agility and speed over brute strenghts and this is reflected in their mutations. Where male astartes develop a bulky muscular mass, females' shape don't change much in constitution but their muscular fibres are greatly enhanced granting them surprising speed and mobility. Aside from Physical mutations each of them develop psykick capabilities. While not all develop them to a high enough level to become librarians each of them is able to pull minor tricks and illusions. Their signature ability, though, is to be able to alter their looks even to an incorporeal form such as a thick mist, ignoring deadly blows and taking advantage of the surprise to retaliate. While one may argue that those abilities are powerful, with them comes also flaws. Due to their similarity with eldars and them being psykers, their souls are prized by the dark gods in substitution of eldar's ones. another great flaw, beside becoming blood thirsty berserkers once a month, resides in their strongest power. The time a warmaiden can stay in her mistform increase with experience but it's not free of risk. The longer one stay in such a form the harder it becomes to correctly recompose one's body. This leads to some astartes morphing back without entire parts of their bodies like limbs, when lucky, or a vital organ in the direst cases.